With all the (overblown) fanfare and media coverage on the release of the iPhone 3GS and the update to iPhone O.S. 3.0, I thought I'd just post this comic strip...

Also check out the iPhone 3GS / Palm Pre flow chart (pix)

Waiting for the Random Silence

Transformers 2: CGI Megan Fox Even Hotter This Time (video)

Stop Motion Shaming (video)

Singing At McDonald's Counter (video)

Literal "Total Eclipse of the Heart" (video)

Too Honest Love Ballad (video)

Standup Aided by Legos (video)

Pedobear "Doubt" Trailer (video)

Kitten Tackles Pillow Tackles Kitten (video)

Pet Hunt (video)

Exploring the Mysteries of the Mind with the Sims 3 (link)

If I was writing an ongoing novel about my everyday life, maybe it would go something like this...

Volume 32, Chapter 11

Since it was time to eat dinner with my wife, I thought I would take the opportunity to try out the new soda that I bought from the supermarket recently. Diet Mountain Dew. This was a purchase that was a complete spur of the moment, and besides my loving regular Mountain Dew soda, I decided to take a gamble on this new variation.
"You know it's not going to taste good," I remembered my wife telling me at that time, as I put two boxes of the drink in the shopping cart.
"Possibly, but look, there's zero calories, carbs, and sugar, so it'll at least be a little healthier for me," which was my response in defense of my decision. I'm pretty sure I was actually trying to convince myself when I said that.

"What would you like to drink?" I asked my wife, as I walked away from the dinner table towards the refrigerator in the kitchen.
"Green Tea," she responded.
"You mean this?" I answered back holding a bottle of "Supau," which I knew was clearly not what she wanted, but I love teasing her so.
"No, that's Supau, I said green tea."
I return back with her drink, and the soda can of Diet Mountain Dew.

The moment of truth was at hand, I put my thumb underneath the aluminum clip on top of the can, I opened it, and took a sip of the drink.
"Hey, it's not bad at all. It doesn't really taste like Mountain Dew though, but I like it."
So my decision paid off after all, and after that initial taste, I left the dinner table again and proceeded to put more soda cans of the drink in the refrigerator. I returned back to the table and drank some more.

"Yeah, it definitely has a more bubbly feeling, like a Sprite or Squirt. You should try it, I think you'd like it."
"No, that's okay." She unenthusiastically answered back.
"I got to say though, for some reason, they seemed to have put less soda in the can. Look, I'm almost done, and I didn't really drink that much."
It was an odd observation of mine, and I attributed it to the fact that it was a new product, or possibly just a defect in the manufacturing. My wife laughs after I said that, and I took that as if she found humor at my misfortune of not having a full soda can. She has said in the past that she thinks I'm a funny guy, but there are moments where I can't help wonder whether she's laughing with me, or at me.

Several days pass, and I'm finding myself drinking Diet Mountain Dew at least once a day. I'm accepting the fact that maybe drinking this soda isn't going to make my life any healthier than before. Especially at the rate I'm going with the drink.
"I'm really liking this after all. You really should try it." I once again make that suggestion to my wife.
"No, I don't really care for it," was the response I once again got.
"Okay, but I still think you'd like it. By the way, it's weird, but all the other cans seem to be as full as they should be, except for that one can I drank the other day."
For some reason, that moment stayed in my head, and maybe it's partly because I felt ripped off by that can somehow. Just like last time, my wife just laughs after I said that.
"Wait, did you not notice that I drank from that can? That's the reason why it seemed emptier to you."
I was dumbfounded after she said that. I really did not put two and two together and felt like an idiot.
"What?! Why didn't you say anything?" Was the only thing I could ask her.
"I thought you were just being stupid and playing dumb, when you were wondering what happened to your drink."
So she was laughing with me after all? At least unintentionally that seemed to be the case.

"Wait, so did you like it?" I ask this, as I realized she did try Diet Mountain Dew after all.
"Nope, not really."

How Strong is Your Relationship? Your Relationship is Strong

You've built the foundation of a great relationship, and it would take a lot to shake it. Through good communication and respect, you have a true love that can last a lifetime. Keep doing what you're doing, and your relationship should stay healthy for a long time. Everyone has rough patches. It's all about surviving them together and coming out stronger.

What I've been listening to lately...

1) Parachute - losing sleep
2) Phoenix - wolfgang amadeus phoenix
3) Spinal Tap - back from the dead
4) Taking Back Sunday - new again
5) Kanye West - 808s and heartbreak
6) Metallica - St.Anger

Looking for a portable mp3/video player that meets my needs have proven to be very disappointing. I never thought that I would miss my Dell Axim so much, as that turned out to be the best portable mp3/video player that I've ever own. The Sony Walkman didn't fit all my criteria, neither did the Sanza Fuze, and surprisingly the Zune was a no no too. The very popular iPod line was the only hope I had, and regretfully it too wasn't completely what I was looking for (although it was very close). I was begrudgingly stuck using my BlackBerry Storm as my mp3 player, and while it was adequate and met my basic needs, I wasn't happy falling on that. Then after a couple of weeks doing the research, I finally found what I was looking for. "Podtrapper." That's an application for my Storm that is intended for podcasts and what not, but surprisingly enough, it's the closest thing out there that met my criteria for what I wanted in a portable mp3/video player.

So what were my criteria?
Portable? Yes
Plays mp3 and video? Yes
Instant custom playlist creation on the device? Yes
Video playlist allowed? Yes (this was a big factor that most mp3/video players couldn't do)
Allows mp3 AND video into one playlist? Yes (another huge factor that was lacking with the others)
Dedicated keys to play/pause, rewind, and fast forward? YES (the Storm's convenience keys)
Integrated speakers on the device? Yes (my Storm's speaker is even louder than my Dell Axim's)
Easy way of transferring music/videos from PC to device? Yes (drag and drop yo!)
Word processing? Yes (didn't expect to find this on other players, but since the Storm's got it...)
Affordability? $10 (+ The Storm's price, if you count that)
...oh, and I guess it has podcast playing features too, although I'm actually ignorant about those. heh

So there it is. Podtrapper + BlackBerry Storm = my portable mp3/video player, and a smart phone too. Which brings me to the point that while that list looks pretty close to what an iPhone can do, if you notice there are a few criteria that it can't meet, that my Podtrapper + Storm can. Besides, I'm a verizon guy, and an iPhone wasn't even an option (iPod touch maybe, but that too didn't work out for me).

Now the Podtrapper isn't completely perfect, as it is still more or less a work in progress. There is still the problem that once a file in the playlist has already been played, it automatically gets taken off the playlist. In order to put that file back in the playlist, I have to mark it as "restart playback." This is a little bit of a hassle and kills the whole "going back and forth between files on a playlist" thing. They are aware of this issue and will work on it for a future update, but it's something I can completely live with considering what else this does right. Also, if you are a person that likes creating your own playlist on the computer (m3u) and transferring it over to the player, it doesn't look like PodTrapper accepts that. I don't really do that though, so it's not a huge deal. So far those are the few negatives I've noticed, as I've only really been using PodTrapper for a few days now. Despite the small issues, consider me a happy camper.

For the record, I am currently using Podtrapper Beta v.2.1.1
http://www.versatilemonkey.com

Moment in the Random Sun

Eugene Mirman High School Commencement (video)

WGN Reporter Dunks On Kid, Makes Him Cry (video)

Guy With Sword Interrupts Neighbor's Porn (video)

Talent Audition Goes Poorly (video)

Tyranosauraus Breakup (video)

Fox News Has No Idea What's Going On (video)

Bill O'Reilly FTL (video)

funny monkey encounter (video)

Saved By The Bell Reunion Update 3 (video)

Eminem Teaches Jimmy Kimmel to Rap (video)

- Have you seen that site "timetravelfund.com" before? Would you pay that site $10 now, if it gives you the chance to go to the future via time travel? Unbelievable right? A scam? Sure sounds like it. In concept it's a great idea though, by letting that $10 grow in interest, in 500 years it could cost billions of dollars. Then once time travel is available for use, they'll use that money to come back here to our present, and then take us to the future. Fantastic idea right? Sure. However, shouldn't we already have heard that somebody has in fact gone to the future? Like a news report about a missing friend or relative, and the disappearance linked to this website? Quick, somebody make a movie out of this.

- You ever go to forums or message boards, and somebody posts a question that really should be answerable if that person just google it? I never saw the site "lmgtfy.com" until recently, but I think it's hilarious that now people are able to reply back to those kinds of questions by mockingly doing the google search for them. It's more steps than just saying "just google it" or by just directly answering the question, but it is pretty funny.
For example, person asks "Does anybody know the age of a 5 year old dog in dog years?"
You can reply back with a link like this : http://tinyurl.com/ku4avj

- Is it really important for you to know what's popular at any particular moment? You know, what the trend is? Well, apparently you can find that out by using the website "whatthetrend.com," which takes advantage of twitter. So if you want to be hip and cool by being sooo up to date with what's popular today, you can visit that website. See a movie title showing up on that list because lots of people are talking about it and you now want to see it so you don't want to be left out? Yeah, that's the site for you to go to. See a name of a person (like a celebrity) showing up on that list because lots of people are talking about that person and you now want to know more about that person so you don't want to be left out? Yeah, that's the site for you to go to. If you really need to use that site, I got one word for you... Loser.

After the recent WWDC and the iPhone OS 3.0 plus iPhone 3G-S announcements, I would like to mockingly welcome iPhone users out there to several amenities that we non-iPhone users have enjoyed for quite a while now. Cut/Copy & Paste, a landscape qwerty keyboard, MMS, tethering, auto focus on the camera, video camera, voice dialing, etc, etc,. Yes, I realize that the iPhone still has other functions that are unique to itself, as well as being a bit more "smoother" overall in design, but still for a phone that was dubbed the "Jesus phone," it sure originally didn't have a lot of stuff that should have been standard for cell phones, and people put up with it. I'll give Apple this though, they are at least continuing in the right path to getting the iPhone into becoming the best phone out there (if you like touch screen phones that is). Too bad it's still being held back by AT&T though.

Random White Noise

Birthday Cake Meltdown Baby (video)

Dog Exercises with Owner (video)

Philosophical Bouncer (video)

Hardly Working: Time Traveler (video)

pygmy jerboa (video)

Air Sex World Championships - NSFW? (video)

Afro-Ninja's Web Redemption (video)

$10,000, Fully Functional R2-D2 (video)

PG PORN: Helpful Bus (video)

Flashback : People who only have rabbit ears (audio)

Movies I've seen recently...

The Hangover (2009)  B+

It's probably not often that you have to debate whether to leave a baby that you've never seen before alone in a luxury hotel suite, because there happens to be a tiger in the bathroom, and you can't remember how it even got to that point. Well that's exactly the type of situation that the characters of "The Hangover" have to deal with. Directed by Todd Phillips, this take of a bachelor party trip in Las Vegas that involves drunken misadventures is quite entertaining, hilarious, and one that should not try to emulate in real life. It plays off somewhat like a silly mystery, where the characters try and figure out the clues of what happened in their bachelor party, because they all do not remember the events. Stealing a cop car and Mike Tyson's tiger, plus accidentally getting married to a Las Vegas stripper/prostitute, are just a few of the antics that they slowly find out, not to mention the fact that they can't find the groom. The movie moves at a really good pace and doesn't let up on the humor, and the actors from Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, and Zach Galifianakis all carry the film perfectly with great chemistry. Galifianakis in particular is an awesomely bizarre odd character and steals just about every scene that he is in, with some of the most funniest lines of the movie. Sure there are some plot points that defy logic, and I suppose the comedy is mostly sophomoric humor, but these do not detract from how fun "The Hangover" is.

Land of the Lost (2009) C+

I didn't really know what to expect from "Land of the Lost," except for the fact that it's suppose to be a comedy, and that it's based on an old TV show of the same name. It does star the always funny Will Ferrell so the comedy comes with his involvement, but I definitely was not expecting the movie to be a complete farce. It really felt like a bunch of Saturday Night Live skits strung together into a movie. So what happened with the movie is that it has a lot of nonsensical things occurring, that kind of makes the whole thing kind of stupid, except that it's suppose to be stupid, stupid-funny. Forget the science fiction aspect of the premise, because that's pretty much thrown out the window in favor of sight gags. I admittedly did find "Land of the Lost" to be more or less entertaining and funny, with the best scenes involving the dinosaur "grumpy" (don't insult a T-Rex's intellect or pay the consequences). The character of Cha-ka as played by Jorma Taccone, and of course Will Ferrell as Dr. Rick Marshall were amusing to watch. However, despite the moments of comedy, the adventure aspect of the story, and the good visuals, the movie still felt like it didn't really have much going for it that stood out. "Land of the Lost" ended up being just another average movie, despite the above average production and cast. As much as I enjoyed it, I still felt quite a bit disappointed.

Twilight (2008)  B-

Based on the popular book of the same name by Stephanie Meyer, "Twilight" is yet another take on the vampire mythos. In the case of this movie, there's a huge emphasis on the love story between a seventeen years old girl named Bella; as played awkwardly well by Kristen Stewart, and Edward, as played by Robert Pattinson at his best tall, dark, mysterious pretty boy vampire with a tragic heart of gold mode. That's the central core of the appeal for the movie, their forbidden love story. That's also probably my main problem with the film, as the love story between the two felt more like a puppy dog kind of love between two teenagers, as opposed to the true love that the story makes it out to be. I guess that is the point however, the simplicity and fairy tale notion that these two characters can fall head over heels in love with each other from some quite honestly superficial reasons. The movie thankfully has an interesting mythological foundation that grounds the story, and the Cullen family of vampires that do not kill humans is a fascinating part of that. It's however the smaller scenes like the relationship between Bella and her dad; as played by Billy Burke, are what I thought worked the best in this movie. Directed by Catherine Hardwicke, "Twilight" works as well as it does as a modestly produced tale, despite the fact that it tries and acts like a huge budget epic saga.